Rei Sakuma/Profile
"The Demon King who rules in the dead of night." A self-proclaimed "vampire" who finds it hard to be active during the daytime thanks to his weakness to sunlight. One of the "Three Oddballs" and once a member of the former "Five Oddballs" as well. Rei talks like an old man and knows a good deal about the academy's history. He's the eldest among the third year students after having spent a year studying abroad. Though he dotes on his little brother Ritsu Sakuma often, the person in question actually loathes him. A member of the unit UNDEAD, as well as its leader. Though he watches over the mismatched members of his group with their strong personalities that often clash, he tends to let them act freely. Personality Appearance Rei is a tall young man with a good build. He has slightly long, wavy black hair that stops at his shoulders and curves inward, and red eyes. He wears the school uniform with the white shirt unbuttoned at the collar and a green tie. Over the shirt, he wears a dull brown sweater with dark gray buttons under his school blazer, which is left unbuttoned. He also wears black loafers and red stud earrings. On stage he wears UNDEAD's uniform. It includes a fur-lined jacket with half sleeves. It has double buttons on the front, outlined in red. The sides of the arms of the jacket are grey with a white pattern. The lining on the jacket is white. He wears a dark gray v-necked shirt that's tucked in. He also wears a dark gray belt, with a golden buckle. On the side, there's a dark gray bandanna with a white pattern. It has a golden beaded chain. He wears black pants and high black boots that cross down over the top. He wears a silver cross necklace, and black gloves with holes on the back of the hand. The outfit also has a black peaked cap, decorated with a silver beaded chain across the top. Trivia *Rei's first name's kanji (零) stands for zero. *He shares the same birthday as Izumi Sena from 3-A. *Rei is the only one to not have a spoken line in the first verse of Melody in the Dark. *He can play the violin, and, like Ritsu, he can play the piano. In a 4koma, it is shown he can also play the drums. *He can't stand the taste of blood and takes iron tablets instead and prefers tomato juice.Rei's first sub story *In the CN story, In the Dark, Rei is shown to be so careless he'll forget to eat and drink expired tomato juice without paying attention. **In Summer Live, Rei wanted somewhere cool to sleep and ended up sleeping on the cafeteria floor despite Mao's concerns about how that may be unsanitary. **In stories such as Blood Banquet and the official 4koma, both UNDEAD and the Aoi twins are shown to look after Rei, who teasingly plays up how helpless he is (being elderly) without assistance. **In stories such as Pirates and Setsubun Festival, it is shown that Rei often does make genuine blunders as well and does require physical assistance. However, he acts as if he were merely playing up his old man persona so he is often not taken seriously. *Rei states that his coffin, built by Natsume, also doubles as a living space, and by tricking it with excellent arranging skills, he's able to fit in items such as manga borrowed from one of the Aoi twins, gardening magazines, clothes and even a refrigerator full of dry-cured ham. His coffin also has wheels. *Madara is Rei's successor.Aquarium **Though it's unclear what exactly being Rei's "successor" entails, in stories such as Shinsengumi Madara references he's learned a number of underhanded means of persuasion from Rei. **Ritsu states that Madara is often over at their home for that reason.Beasts Spoilers: *In Crossroad, it is shown that Rei, Keito, and Koga were once a part of a unit called DEADMANZ (also translated as "Deadman's" and "Deadmans"). In Easter, it is shown this unit was later transformed into UNDEAD. *Leo states that Rei would often fall unconscious around school and Leo would often be the one to find and help him.Dark Night Halloween *Ever since Rei was a child, he was "beautiful" and intelligent. He would wander around graveyards and adults would come to him for advice, and he accidentally developed a following of devotees who would live by his every word despite his young age. This continued even as he grew.Crossroad **Keito describes this as being reduced to "zero," like Rei's namesake, as Rei was so capable and intelligent that, in his opinion, it meant there was no point in existing so long as Rei did. *Koga states that, while in the previous year (such as during Crossroad), Rei spoke and behaved in a free-wheeling, punk-like manner, but, after "breaking down," Rei began to speak like an old man.Repayment Festival *It was stated in Magicians Assemble and then shown in Crossroad that Rei used to be the student council president until Eichi took over. **Rei states he only took over this position because Keito asked him to, as he considered Keito a friend from childhood. **Rei implies his fondness for Keito initially from the fact that, whereas the people around him would be taken in by his charisma and grow dependent on him, Keito, as a child, would continue to try and defy Rei. *In Crossroad it's revealed that Ritsu and Rei's vampiric condition is a genuine illness that makes them nocturnal, weak to sunlight, and thirst for blood as sustenance. **This condition is hereditary, and Rei explains that much of his family, which worships vampire mythos, sees it as a mark of pride. **Their family believes themselves to be vampires, and perform a "blood drinking" ritual on Easter, and have a yearly reunion in Transylvania.Easter *In Crossroad, it's revealed Rei's year spent "studying abroad" was spent largely: **Meeting with researchers overseas to seek a cure for his and Ritsu's condition; **Resolving conflicts out of obligation and offering help to those who asked it of him; **Performing and doing idol work; **And, once the War began, resolving conflicts in Yumenosaki's sister schools across the globe. Eichi reveals in Magicians Assemble that these conflicts were artificially created to force Rei to exhaust himself and remain away from school. *In Crossroad it's shown that this constant cycle of being forced to prioritize others over himself caused Rei's physical state to weaken to the point of near-collapse. In Magicians Assemble, however, we see he's unable to stop himself from helping others, even if being unable to commit to a handful of people in order to help a larger number of people caused the students at Yumenosaki, as well as Ritsu, to hate him for not being "there" for them in their perspectives. Voice Actor Comment "I felt that this is a character very worth portraying. He speaks like an old man; he has to repeat a grade; everyone treats him like a weirdo; and most of all, he's Dracula. I had a lot of fun acting out this character with so many quirky traits. Sakuma Rei... a great character, indeed." }} Sources Category:Profile